In the 1970s Jean Levet became aware of the danger hovering over the Boucherie district, which was then unsanitary. The municipality at the time, led by Louis Longequeue, wanted to raze it and replace it with ultra-modern buildings.
With a few, including Gilbert Font, then municipal councilor, Geneviève Mausset, Jean-Pierre Loustaud, Jean-Louis Devoyon, Louis Bonneau, Doctor Jean-Marie Pradet, Michel Toulet, in 1973 he founded the Renaissance du Vieux association. Limoges, which he presided over until his death in 2006. He is its soul and regularly publishes a bulletin which will never cease to oppose, among other things, this modernization project but also to remind or introduce people to Limougauds the history and treasures of their city. The association then creates a real ecosystem around the Boucherie district, which results in a series of happy initiatives: The spawning of the small stomachs, the opening of the Maison de la Boucherie, the renovation of the half-timberings…etc.
Jean Levet also published The History of Limoges (volume 1: From the origins to the end of the Ancien Régime, volume 2: The Revolution) and wrote and published a series of monographs under the label Discovering Ancient Limoges.
